


Youth

by shavenfuture



Series: Song Fics [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Lance hates himself, Langst, M/M, Major Character Injury, Song fic, all you need to know is that kuron is shiro, and the story continues until the castle of lions is destroyed, keith hasn't reunited with them yet until the end, oops sorry, takes place at the beginning of season 6 to the end kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-11
Updated: 2018-07-11
Packaged: 2019-06-08 16:31:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15247323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shavenfuture/pseuds/shavenfuture
Summary: Shadows settle on the place, that you left.Lance couldn’t shake the weird feeling he had. It was always there, lurking. Reminding him that Keith was gone, with the Blade of Marmora and possibly never coming back to Voltron.One night, Lance, out of sheer desperation to be closer to Keith and remind himself that the boy with a mullet wasn’t just a beautiful dream, makes his way to the former paladin’s room. When he steps inside, it’s dark and empty because Keith didn’t keep much with him. He just need him and his knife. He didn’t need Lance. No one needed Lance.





	Youth

**Author's Note:**

> hahaha, feel free to hate me after.
> 
> songfic for "Youth" by Daughter
> 
> sorry if the timeline feels weird and everything's repeated, i just really wanted to write this fic based around this song.
> 
> oof tell me if there's any grammar mistakes or choppy bits or anything!

_Shadows settle on the place, that you left._

 

Lance couldn’t shake the weird feeling he had. It was always there, lurking. Reminding him that Keith was _gone,_ with the Blade of Marmora and possibly never coming back to Voltron.

One night, Lance, out of sheer desperation to be closer to Keith and remind himself that the boy with a mullet wasn’t just a beautiful dream, makes his way to the former paladin’s room. When he steps inside, it’s dark and empty because Keith didn’t keep much with him. He just need him and his knife. He didn’t need Lance. No one needed Lance.

 

_Our minds are troubled by the emptiness._

 

Lance couldn’t focus anymore. Sure, maybe it seemed like he was more devoted than ever, but it was all a distraction. His constant training with his blaster and broadsword was a distraction, not wanting to think about how empty the Castle of Lions felt without that _stupid fucking mullet._

Lance knew he wasn’t the only one who missed Keith, but he didn’t know if everyone else had the same, constant ache in his chest so bad he thought he was dying. Maybe one person did - _Shiro._

Shiro has been different. Angry and snippy and blaming every bad thing on Lance, which, Lance thought, was valid. Part of him wondered if this was because Shiro was waking up and seeing how worthless Lance was, or if it was because he missed his younger brother and didn’t know what to do with dread.

Lance didn’t know which one he preferred.

 

_Destroy the middle, it’s a waste of time._

 

Lance wondered if everything he did up here - if everything _Voltron_ did would matter in the long run. Would Earth be saved? The galaxy? Even if Lotor doesn’t betray them, what’s to say that the violence ends with the Galra? There’s always someone else in the shadows, waiting. Pain and suffering never stops, even if one has been vanquished.

Would it be better to just give up and die, if none of it mattered in the end?

 

_From the perfect start to the finish line._

 

Lance remembers when he first joined Voltron. He was excited, ecstatic, to be _apart_ of something. And it was all great. They were saving people and planets left and right.

Then Shiro was kidnapped. And Keith left. And Shiro wasn’t the same after being kidnapped for the _second time by the Galra._ And Lance started getting ignored and ignored and started longing for his days at the Garrison. He missed sneaking into the kitchen at night to cook with Hunk and believing that Pidge was a boy.

He missed who he was back then.

Lance doesn’t even recognize himself anymore and doesn’t see a finish line.

 

_And if you’re still breathing, you’re the lucky ones._

 

They’re all lucky to be alive, Lance knows that. Shiro is lucky that he’s still alive after being taken by the Galra twice. Keith is lucky to still be alive while living under the Blade’s crazy self-sacrifice rules. Allura and Coran are lucky to be alive after their whole planet was destroyed. Hell, Lance is lucky to be alive after saving Coran on Arus.

Lance knew he was lucky. Lance knew he shouldn’t be alive.

Especially not after - _no._ He couldn’t think about that.

Lance wondered when it came to the point that he counted breathing as a blessing.

 

 _'Cause most of us are heaving through corrupted lungs._   


No one on Team Voltron was without their problems.

Shiro was kidnapped by the Galra twice.

Keith was half-Galran.

Pidge’s family was taken, although she has gotten them back.

Allura and Coran were the last living Alteans, besides _Lotor._

Hunk fell in love with an alien, despite never knowing when he’ll see Shay again.

And Lance _died._

 

 _Setting fire to our insides for fun_   


Lance trained until exhaustion. Until he couldn’t stand. Until he couldn’t _feel._ It didn’t feel good, but it felt like _something._

He wonders what he did in his past life to get here.

Lance wonders when he stopped dreading training and started craving.

He wonders when the feeling of something became the feeling of pleasure and comfort. A subtle reminder he was alive and his heart was beating in his chest.

 _God_ , _why did Allura bring him back?_

 

 _Collecting names of the lovers that went wrong_   
_The lovers that went wrong._   


It was hard not to think about Keith while Lance trained. He’s slowly become more and more like the boy.

He was secluded and withdrawn and trained every second. But he wasn’t treated with the respect that Keith was treated with. Not by Shiro, not by Allura, not by _anyone._

Lance wondered when he stopped resenting Keith to becoming Keith to loving Keith.

Lance wondered if Keith was still here if Allura would’ve brought him back.

Lance wondered if Keith would ever feel the same.

 _No,_ he decided, _he wouldn’t._

 

_We are the reckless,_

 

Lance was becoming more and more reckless, constantly putting himself in harm’s way so that his teammates wouldn’t get hurt. Relishing in every jolt through his body reminding him he was _alive._

No one said anything.

No one knew what to say.

Except Shiro.

But they don’t count Shiro’s angry screams at Lance.

 

 _We are the wild youth_   


Sometimes they forget how young they are. They’re _so fucking young._

Shiro was only 25 and was the leader of an intergalactic fighting robot to take down the empire that had kidnapped him twice and stripped him of an arm.

Keith was only 18 and was in a spy organization to infiltrate the empire that had taken his older brother twice.

Pidge was only 15 and fought the Galaxy Garrison to find her family, only to be shot into space and found them herself, imprisoned by the very empire she was trying to take down.

Hunk was only 17 and was in space, trying to save the entire galaxy and his brain was full of information on things he shouldn’t know. Like what a certain planet’s distress signal looks like or how badly the Galra has imprisoned the galaxy.

Lance was only 17 and was in space, away from his family that he loved more than life itself. He bonded with everyone there, only to have Keith leave and Shiro to suddenly hate him and his best friends to drift away.

They all longed to be back home on Earth, but they no longer had control over their lives.

 

 _Chasing visions of our futures_   


What they wanted for themselves in the future has changed.

Shiro no longer wants to watch Keith grow at the Galaxy Garrison as he helped out with training. No, Shiro just wanted to _survive._

Keith no longer wants to become a fighter pilot and make his brother proud, be damned his mother who left him. No, Keith just wanted to _survive._

Pidge no longer wanted to see the stars with her family, she’s had a lifetime filled with stars. No, Pidge just wanted to _survive._

Hunk no longer wanted to go into space with his best friend by his side, making his family proud. No, Hunk just wanted to _survive._

Lance no longer wanted to touch the stars and say goodbye to his family and his dumb rivalry with Keith. No, Lance just wanted his family and friends to _survive._ He just wanted Earth to _survive._

 

 _One day we'll reveal the truth_   


One day, they long to go home and tell their families everything. Shiro wanted to go home and take down the Galaxy Garrison for abandoning him and get Keith’s academic life back on track. Keith just wanted to go home and sit on Earth, his brother by his side and safe. Pidge just wanted to eat dinner with her family again and never have to worry about never seeing them again. Hunk just wanted to see the ground again and his family and Earth food. Lance just wanted to see that the Galra stayed away from his home and that Varadero Beach was how he left it.

 

 _That one will die before he gets there._   


In a war, not everyone survives. They all know this, but try not to think about this.

Lance can never help himself and how, well if he died once, then God will balance it out eventually and kill him. He just hopes that if he dies before landing on Earth and apologizing to his family for making them worry, that he can just _look_ at Earth and see it undamaged and unharmed. And that when he gets to Heaven, his abuela isn’t waiting for him.

He could accept his death if he just knew that everything was okay.

 

 _And if you're still bleeding, you're the lucky ones._   


Every time Lance bleeds during training or fighting, it reminds him that his heart is beating. That he’s lucky to be alive. That the drop of red on his armor or in the training room or in Red was a reminder that Lance was alive and he hadn’t left for good yet.

Lance wondered when he counted seeing his own blood as lucky. Was it before or after he died? Did his brain already stop before his heart did?

 

 _'Cause most of our feelings, they are dead and they are gone._   


Lance feels one feeling - longing. Longing for Keith to come back. Longing to know that Earth is okay. Longing to know that if he died, someone could take his place, that Keith would come back and save the universe for him.

That’s the only feeling he’s remembered in a while.

 

 _We're setting fire to our insides for fun._   
_Collecting pictures from a flood that wrecked our home,_ _  
It was a flood that wrecked this home._

 

Lance could do nothing but watch as the Castle of Lions was destroyed. It was like watching his own reckoning that happened a long time ago, but physical and real and it wasn’t him, it was his _home._ It was the last place that his brain registered as _safe,_ even after Sendak, because even if the crystal corrupted their system, he had his teammates. And even if his teammates ignored Lance, he knew they wouldn’t just let him die without a backup and that he was safe as long as Keith wasn’t there, but he wasn’t safe because he couldn’t focus, distracted by how much he longed for him to be back.

So, Lance just watched, witnessing his own destruction for the second time.

 

 _And you caused it,_   
_And you caused it,_   
_And you caused it_   


Lance knew it was his fault the Castle of Lions was destroyed. If only he listened to Shiro and stopped worrying about seeming desperate to Keith and told him. If only he did _something,_ then Shiro would’ve been saved sooner and the Castle, the last piece of the real Altea, wouldn’t be destroyed. Lance feels like he just destroyed Altea with his bare hands, and the last piece of himself along with it.

 

 _Well I've lost it all, I'm just a silhouette,_   


Lance isn’t noticeable, which is shocking to him. No one’s pointed out his failures, just letting him flicker through life.

He wondered if he missed being screamed at if it meant he was noticed. But he didn’t deserve anyone’s attention on him. Not after what he did.

 

 _A lifeless face that you'll soon forget,_   


Lance knows he looks dead on the outside, and he feels like it on the inside. Not even the sight of his blood can ground him anymore. He yearns for the day they forget him completely and leave him behind, giving him what he deserves. He’s waiting for it, anticipating it now that Keith’s back. And he’s _glad_ Keith’s back, he really is. If Lance gets to see that Keith is okay with his own two eyes, it’s worth it to be deserted and left for dead.

 

_My eyes are damp from the words you left,_

_Ringing in my head, when you broke my chest._   
_Ringing in my head, when you broke my chest._   


Even though it wasn’t Shiro who hurt Lance, who said the things it said, the words still linger. The truth always lingers. The tears always linger. Lance thought he was done with emotions, but sitting in his lion, sobbing, he realized that his emotions would never truly be gone, that he would always be stuck with his burden.

And Lance felt his heart break over and over as his idol’s face shouted and screamed at him in his dreams and his memories.

 

 _And if you're in love, then you are the lucky one,_   


Lance felt lucky when another emotion emerged one day that wasn’t hurt. No, it was love. Love for his family back home. Love for his team, even if they didn’t reciprocate. Love for Keith, and Lance knew he didn’t reciprocate.

Lance wondered when he started thanking God because he loved something.

 

 _'Cause most of us are bitter over someone._   


Lance will always be disappointed that he could never have Keith and that he couldn’t stop the boy with the mullet looking at him with concerned eyes. But Lance couldn’t break him by burdening him. He’d rather be bitter over lost love than see Keith react to his emptiness.

Before, Lance would’ve thought that telling Keith wouldn’t have mattered, he wouldn’t have cared. But it’s hard to hide from concerned violet eyes and deny the fact that Keith whispered, _“are you okay?”_ to him every night.

 

 _Setting fire to our insides for fun,_   
_To distract our hearts from ever missing them._ _  
But I'm forever missing him._

 

Lance felt himself fading away. God, _everything hurt._ It was worse than the first time he died, but same reason, different person.

He wondered how much Keith would hate him after this. He wondered this as Keith ran towards him, fighting through Galra soldiers to reach a dying Lance.

Lance let himself sob in public, completely and utterly scared that death was now here. He had no way of knowing that his family was okay and prayed to God that his abuela wouldn’t be where he was going - whether it was Heaven or Hell.

Lance focused on the pain of dying to ignore the pain in his chest at the thought of leaving his family - blood and bonded. At the thought of leaving _Keith._

 

 _And you caused it,_   
_And you caused it,_   
_And you caused it_   


Lance heard Keith faintly screaming, asking him why he did that. Why he gave up his life for his.

Lance closed his eyes and slipped into nothing, accepting that he caused his death because he was too afraid to watch something else be taken from him.

**Author's Note:**

> oops sorry.


End file.
